With "One Day I Woke Up and Realized I Was a Cloud," Désirée Scheidegger presents a wonderful poetic narrative. The Bernese author tells the story of Claude, who is both a cloud and the male and female main character. The author skillfully describes contrasting, connecting, and diverse life worlds in a vivid and realistic manner.

In her debut "Aaregeflüster" (2017), Désirée Scheidegger surprised readers with a fresh, flowing language. In her second book, "Gelafer" (2019), the author dedicated herself to the quirky and dreamlike. In her latest novel, "Die Fragmentsammlerin" (2021), she blends the real with the surreal. In her new novel, she unites all the virtues of her previous works, seasoning them with a touch of humor and absurdity. She does this by having a cloud narrate the story of itself when it was still a human named Claude Bieri.

The narrative begins very realistically, becomes increasingly blurred, and the essence of being human fades like the sun on cloudy days. Until the cloud itself no longer knows who it is and who it once was. With a wonderful twist, the author shifts from the male protagonist to the female protagonist in the midst of the story. Désirée Scheidegger depicts the everyday life of a male and a female Claude. The differences between the two characters are quite significant, aside from their names. The male Claude is a librarian at a university library, outwardly rough, structured, bound to processes, and inflexible, yet quite stable in life and sociable. The female Claude is currently unemployed, sensitive and insecure, spontaneous and chaotic, living from day to day, sometimes more withdrawn, and psychologically unstable. While reading, one immerses in the worlds of both Claudes, getting to know them individually and independently, while also creating connections between them.